However, Victoria says the federal government has ''put a gun to its head'' and is refusing to provide the states with money under the Gonski school funding reforms unless they sign up to the languages plan.

''They can't deliver other than by blackmailing because we employ teachers and run schools,'' said Victorian Education Minister Martin Dixon.

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He believed it was ''unconscionable'' to announce the plan without consulting the states when the education ministers were scheduled to meet tomorrow.

The government's white paper says that all students will have access to studying at least one ''priority language'' - Mandarin, Hindi, Indonesian and Japanese - throughout primary and high school by 2025.

Each state and territory would be responsible for administering their language programs, although changing their curriculum would be compulsory in return for more funding for the government and the non-government sectors.

Mr Dixon said he was concerned about the impact on Victorian schools that taught languages other than the four Asian priority languages. ''I'm a great believer in allowing schools to choose the language they offer,'' he said.

The Baillieu government has pledged that every student in prep to year 10 will learn a second language by 2025, starting with prep in 2015.

''At this stage we lead the nation … I'm not going to sign up to anything that is going to be a backwards step for Victoria,'' Mr Dixon said.

Every Australian school must also be linked to an Asian school to support teaching priority Asian languages by 2025, including through increased use of the National Broadband Network.

The reforms will be built into the government's Gonski school reforms that are currently being negotiated with the states and territories, and which the federal government wants to introduce from 2014.

The government says it is too soon to say how much the programs would cost, or how many new teachers would be needed to offer Asian languages to all students.

Jenny Lambert, the director, employment, education and training, of the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said, ''turning vision into reality in the education and training system can often be the most difficult part''. But she said the plan would lay the foundations for a strong Australian future in the so-called ''Asian century''.

''Governments must address education funding, the quality of teaching including rewards for good performance and action against poor teaching, and how we can achieve the number of Asian language teachers needed to meet the goals.''

Kathe Kirby, the executive director of the Asialink and Asia Education Foundation, said drastically expanding Asian language teaching was ''an ambitious goal'', but ''the right way to go''.

''Most countries in the world consistent with us have children exiting school bilingual or, in some cases, trilingual.'' But Ms Kirby said Australia already had strengths in the area.

''Japanese is already the most taught language in Australian schools [and] Indonesian is the third most taught.''

Just 18 per cent of students study an Asian language before year 11, she said, which drops off to 5.8 per cent in year 12.

A spokeswoman for federal School Education Minister Peter Garrett said: ''The precise increase in teachers required will depend on the arrangements of each state, territory and education authority, including how they determine to run the language programs and what they currently have in place.'' She said there were about 3000 Asian language teachers across Australian schools.